The Supercars driving standards advisor was back in the thick of the action in New Zealand as the series continues to free up its racing rules.
On three occasions there was contact between two drivers fighting for the lead, two of which prompted criticism from Kostecki.
The reigning Bathurst 1000 champion was involved in a bruising battle with Chaz Mostert for victory on Saturday, the pair coming to blows before Mostert went on to win.
In that case no penalties for were dished out.
On Sunday, it was Ryan Wood that ran Kostecki wide on the first lap as they scrapped over the lead, with Wood copping a five-second time penalty.
After the Sunday race Kostecki publicly queried why Mostert had escaped penalty while Wood didn’t, hinting at inconsistency in the officiating.
The view that Wood was hard done by was shared by Stewart, although the WAU boss bit his tongue during the post-race press conference.
These latest calls of inconsistency followed an extraordinary meeting on the Thursday of the Taupo event where Baird met with 21 of the 24 drivers to clarify the new approach to the rules.
Kostecki was one of the three drivers that didn’t attend, believed to be related to his schedule.
As for the incidents in question, Baird has clear reasons why they were judged differently.
For Saturday’s race, his justification for not applying any penalties is the role that both drivers played in the contact, such as Kostecki slowing before the initial contact that saw Mostert take the lead, and then Kostecki running off track on his own while attempting to re-take the lead before being run wide again by Mostert while re-joining.
“I said the stewards this is hard, I don’t know if it’s fair but we’ll play on here, because if anybody can give us the product we need it’s these two,” Baird told Speedcafe.
“Brodie was aggrieved with Chaz running him off the road, but what he failed to understand is that it was Chaz’s corner because Brodie had gone in too hard.
“He was re-joining the circuit, he had all four wheels off the circuit. So I understand why [Chaz] squashed him off the road. That’s tit for tat.
“That was really simple for me and that was a great race.”
According to Baird the Wood situation was different in that Wood was the aggressor and ran the race leader off the road.
“That’s a wide bit of road and he chose to leave 12 metres on the inside to the apex because he ran [Kostecki] off the road,” explained Baird.
“He felt he’d left him a bit of road, but I asked him if he thought Brodie had run off the road by himself.
“He said that he didn’t have any choice because he had to get him there, and I understand that. But if you do that, you’ve got to expect a penalty.
“The reason why it was a small penalty not a large is because Brodie didn’t lose that many positions because of Woody, he was escorted off the road and then he bombed it into Turn 9.
“But Brodie didn’t initially leave the road by himself. He had some assistance and that assistance was slightly over the line, so [Wood] got a small penalty.”
Baird reiterated that the nature of the corners and even the potential outcome will play a role in penalties.
“Second gear and fifth gear are very different corners, and they have different outcomes, and different tolerances from race control,” he said.
“There’s a duty of care. Nobody gets hurt in second gear, but pull fifth and sixth and it can be different, including marshals and volunteers.”
The other forceful move for the lead in Taupo was Matt Payne charging past Cam Hill in Sunday’s finale, one that didn’t draw much in the way of discussion, despite Payne using a lot of the inside kerb to get by.
“Payne got away with it because Hill reacted to the car behind,” he said.
“I told the guys in the drivers meeting, if you’re asleep, that’s your problem. At this level, if you leave a hole and somebody’s committed to filling it, don’t close it.
“It was marginal, but the reaction contributed to the contact.”
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